


Of Tatted Wings and War

by Stop_Klancing_Around



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angel Keith (Voltron), Angst, Blood, M/M, Medical Inaccuracies, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Supernatural Elements, i think, lance is freaking out, nothing is really what it seems
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-15
Updated: 2019-06-10
Packaged: 2019-10-10 17:39:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17430485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stop_Klancing_Around/pseuds/Stop_Klancing_Around
Summary: “How did you get here?” Lance asks. It would make sense to ask Keith more important questions like, ‘what are you’ or ‘why do you have wings’. Those questions, but how he gets here seems really stupid right now.“Flew...” Keith said. His voice was faint but it held so much pain. There was a brief motion of fear before floating into Lance’s apartment and slamming it shut.“Floating... You’re floating...” Lance said in astonishment.Or Keith comes to Lance's place in the middle of the night unexpected. Little do they know that it could change their lives. Whether for good or for worse, its still changed.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey
> 
> This was kinda sitting in my docs for a while and have been coming back to edit from time to time. I'm not sure whether or not to continue working on this because it's been sitting for so long.
> 
> This work isn't really beta'd so I want to apologize in advance for any errors or inconsistencies. 
> 
> I think I kept you here long enough.  
> Enjoy :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EDIT: This is the beta version of 6/11/19 from [Ray](http://www.raythenerdyfangirl.tumblr.com)

The sounds of heavy banging at his door wakes Lance from his slumber. He rubs the sleep away from his eyes and glanced at the time to see that it just turned three o’clock. He groans in agony to that.

“Who in the hell is knocking my door at ass o clock?” Lance mumbled out. He gets up from the couch and stretched. Lance didn't realize that he nodded off from studying Calc, hence why the textbook is haphazardly hanging off the coffee table. His notebook was sitting on top of his chest. 'They’re lucky’ he thought. If Lance was sleeping in his room, he wouldn't hear the knocking.

Speaking of the sounds, they became more desperate in the second. 'Con is back...’ Lance thought. Connor was the old dude that was a floor above him. Sometimes he comes back this late to bang at his door until someone opens up. It was annoying, especially when the dude didn't know when to stop.

“I'm coming, I’m coming, jeez” Lance called out. He unlocks the door and removes the deadlocks from the door. “Look, I think you got the wrong apartment number again and I need you t-- HOLY SHIT” Lance sentence falls really short at the sight in front of him.

It was Keith but isn't Keith? His inky, rough hair was replaced with silky, white hair that hugged his face. Keith’s eyes looked a shade lighter than his normal navy ones. It was a very bright purple color, like lavender. His eyes had a foggy glaze to it though. What was concerning was the fact that he's barefooted. Lance doesn't know where Keith came from but his feet were both muddy and bruised. There was a slight indicator that he was wearing shoes but was hastily ripped off.

What was off-putting was the white wings that came off of his head and back. It could’ve been an April's Fools joke but they were in the middle of November. That is also nowhere near Halloween. From the looks of things, the wings are real because the ones on his head had twitched frantically before lying limply back down his head. The other wings had done the same with an uncoordinated dance.

What alarming was the amount of blood that was on him. The white hair was pink tinted and matted with blood. Whatever Keith was wearing was also drenched and matted with blood. There was a large gash on Keith's right shoulder and face. Keith basically looked like he came from a blood bath with bloody Mary. Lance doesn’t know how anyone could have that much blood but he is praying that it's not Keith’s. He looked unstable like his own feet couldn't take the full weight of Keith.

“How did you get here?” Lance asks. It would make sense to ask Keith more important questions like, ‘what are you’ or ‘why do you have wings’. Those questions, but how he gets here seems really stupid right now.

“Flew...” Keith said. His voice was faint but it held so much pain. There was a brief motion of fear before floating into Lance’s apartment and slamming it shut.

“Floating... You’re floating...” Lance said in astonishment. “You’re an... angel?” When Lance thinks back to all of the times that he's been with Keith, the only thing that stood out about him was the large, tatted wings that took up his entire arms like a sleeve. There were a few feathers that lost its place on the wings that littered around his neck and chest. This was back in early September when the weather was still hot.

Keith doesn't reply, however. Lance continued to point and stare at Keith until the said person was still. Keith floated down to his toes.

“Call... Shiro...” was all he said before leaning dangerously forward. Lance barely had a mind to compute before dead weight had hit him in the chest. He looks at the back of him to see a larger, deeper slash that went from the base for his head to the back of his wings straight down.

“Hey, HEY” Lance begins to shake him awake but he laid eerily still. He checks if Keith was still breathing to receive a quick, faint burst of air. Keith is bloody and whoever did this is probably going to finish the job.

'I need to move him. Now’ Lance thought. With such urgency, he first picks up Keith bridal style. The hiss that came out of Keith was pained. 'Right, I forgot about your wings and the gaping slash on your back.’ Lance changed the way he carrying Keith by hauling him over his shoulder. It wasn't graceful and probably made it worse for Keith but it was the only way he thinks that will cause less injury.

Lance begins to move him to the bathroom. The moment he gets there he realizes that the only way he can place Keith down is stomach down. The way the bathroom was, there was no space for both of his wings. The only place he could really put Keith is in his room. His half clean/dirty room. Lance groans to that. The only things that were out of place are books and clothes. He also doesn't have any extra bedding or a sleeping bag. Lance doesn't really have much of a choice at this point. Keith was literally bleeding out and he would need to place him down somewhere to at least address some of the serious problems that are popping up.

He sneaks over to his room and places Keith down on his bed. Once he does that, he pushes the bed away from the window and in the middle of the room. That way, Lance is able to attend to Keith without climbing over him. He needs to tend to Keith ASAP. If not, he will bleed out and that will not be good. Whatever Keith was running from, there is a huge possibility that it may get the idea of where he went. God forbid they come now while Keith is THIS battered. If they were the same thing that did this to Keith then he was screwed. The most Lance could do was hide him and call Shiro. He begins to dial the said person when he reaches his phone. Lance puts him on speaker.

“Lance? What’s going on it’s three ten in the morning” Shiro sounded groggy, but it was understandable since Lance is calling at an ungodly hour.

“Thank goodness you answered”

“Why is that?”

“It's Keith? I think it's Kei-”

“What happened” If Shiro wasn't awake before, he was now. There was a bit of scuffling at his end.

“I don’t know but he’s really hurt. He’s at my place. Did you know he had wings?”

“Lance, do you have a first aid kit?” Shiro sounded urgent. From what it sounds, this has happened to him before. There was a lot more commotion now, especially since someone jumped in the conversation. There was mumbling now.

“Um, yeah but he’s gonna need stitches and from the look of things, he's gonna need a blood transfusion.” Lance can hear Shiro swearing in the background and a brief conversation with someone.

“Do you have a fire escape?”

“Yes.” Lance could hear Shiro closing a door and heavy footsteps. He isn't sure what's going on and he's starting to get spooked.

“Lance, I want you to listen very closely because Keith’s life is in your hands. Do not under any circumstances open the door for anyone except for me. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, but what is goi-?”

“Close your windows and blinds and barricade the door. Text me your address, I’ll need to pick up a few things before I get over there. I’ll call you when I get there.”

“Ooookay bu-”

“And under any circumstances, you are not to open the door. Especially the police. Know your rights because they can not search your place without a warrant. I'll explain when I get there.” With that, the phone clicks off. The chilling revelation of the situation hits Lance with a bucket of ice water.

Lance closes his window and blinds in his room before doing the same with the rest of his apartment. He is also turning off his lights too so that he isn't drawing attention. Lance locks his door up and puts his deadlock in. He even puts up both of his door stoppers, just in case someone wanted to kick the door in. If it’s a thing, however, he doesn’t know how well they would hold. He looks at the floor to see all of the blood that made a large trail to the bathroom and to the bedroom. Lance was even standing in a nice puddle of blood.

“This is going to be a bitch to clean,” Lance said. First thing first, Lance washes his hands and removes his shirt and pants and throws in a bag. He'll wash them later as he heads over to the bathroom for the first aid kit. Lance knows the basic knowledge on how to clean a wound and bandage it up. The issue is stitching some of the gashes that he had. He doesn’t own any medical thread or staples, let alone anesthetic. At the same time, who has any of these at home as a first aid kit. Lance takes what he has and heads over his bedroom. He might as well treat the smaller and semi-deep cuts.

As of late, he is in his boxers. He was about to get into another set of pants that weren’t soiled with blood when there was another knock on the door. He checks his phone to see that Shiro hasn’t texted or called him as he said he would. Lance would think that he’d knock and then call after but Shiro is a man of his words. The knocks became heavier and his phone stayed silent. Lance could feel the blood drain from his face. He looks at the time to see that it was four twenty-four. It was the instant terror that poured upon him as he makes his slow walk to the door. He prays that Keith would stay in the room.

“Who's there?” Lance asks. He wouldn’t open the door unless it was the cops.

“Police. Open the door.” Way to jinx yourself, Lance. He removes the door stoppers and opens the door. The door chain allows the door to open to a certain point. That was all the police was getting.

“Who are you?” Lance gets a good look at the police officer. They did have on the standard uniform and all, but they didn’t have a badge on or a name tag. They also had their hat hanging very low, because of that, Lance couldn’t get a good look at their face. When he thinks about it, this person isn’t showing any kind of skin.

“That is not of your concern.” Lance perks an eyebrow but remains calm. If he freaks out then he’ll blow his cover. His phone starts to vibrate in his hand. He knows its Shiro but he can’t take his call to tell him the window to the kitchen is open. He puts his focus on the situation at hand.

“Okay, have it your way but I'm going to keep my door open my like this.” Lance places one of his foot at the door. From the angle that he is, he could check his phone and send a quick coded text to Shiro and hope to whoever that he catches on. Lance does just that.

“It's whatever you are comfortable with,” The officer said.

“What do you want at this time anyway,” Lance asks.

“I'm looking for someone. He is short and looks a bit rough. He also has white hair and has odd garments on. He also has really bright eyes.” He shows a picture of a very young picture of Keith with the same description that he said. The cons are that Keith looks like he’s twelve in that picture. The picture that he had didn’t really portray Keith in the way that he knew him. The Keith he knew had freckles all over, dark hair, and dark eyes. The current Keith has aged well, minus the hair, pale skin, and the blood.

“Never saw anyone like that. It really sounds like something you made up, sir.” It's a good thing all of that lying he did in the past had trained him just for this point. He is really grateful that it's working.

“A source says that you are harboring such a person in your apartment.” Lance perks up his eyebrow. He can’t lose his cool here.

“Sir, who is awake at this time?”

“Why are you awake then?”

“I am doing something very important as of late. You are interrupting me of such.” Lance hopes that the officer doesn’t ask about that important thing. He doesn’t have anything for that.

“If you don’t have such a person then let me search your flat, just in case.” That made Lance remember what Shiro said, ‘Know your rights’ That made Lance cross his arms.

“Do you have a warrant?” The officer was taken back by the sudden question and begins to fumble.

“No, bu-” Lance makes his attack.

“Then no.” The officer apparently didn’t like that answer.

“Open your door” He begins to force the door open.

“Why? Look I'm in the middle of something very important” The force that the other man was applying on the door was terrifying. He managed to get the door ajar and pop the door chain from the wall. Lance was barefoot, there was no traction that his feet could do to stop that.

“Lance, where did you go?” Lance looks behind him to see Keith walking over to him with a blanket that covered his head and body. Lance was about to faint right then and there. His cover was blown, whoever was at the door just found Keith and Lance was about to find out about what they do to people who hide whatever the hell Keith was. Then he takes a closer look at Keith, he has black hair with freckles that adorn his face and navy blue eyes. It's the same way that he remembers Keith from the first day he met him. He flops onto Lance's back and looks up at him.

The scent of his flat catches him off guard. It smelled like vanilla candles and roses. The floor was littered with rose petals. Where there was supposed to be a bloody trail to the bathroom and bedroom, there was a trail of petals that laid as a substitute. At the moment, Lance was standing on a large pile of petals, that was supposed to be a large puddle of blood. Lance looks at Keith to see him giving Lance the 'play along’ look. There was an urgency to this look so he might as well. It felt like his life was on the line.

“I'm coming, I'm coming. Someone was at the door.” Like the door wasn’t about to be pushed off its hinges. From the corner of Lance’s eye, Shiro was quietly entering through the kitchen with a large bag just to look up to see what’s happening. He ducks under a table after shutting the window.

“Am I interrupting something?” The officer asks dumbly.

“Yes,” The both of them said. There was a flushed look of Keith’s face that says else wise but from the looks of things, The officer buys into it. He apologizes, wishes them a good night and with that leaves.

The second he left, Lance locks his door and places his door stopper back in place.

“Cover the bottom of the door. NOW” Shiro said. Lance is sprinting to get old clothes. He begins to cover the cracks of the door.

“What’s going on,” Lance asks.

“He’s about to teleport, the fumes are toxic to all three of us.” Once Lance was done covering the cracks, he puts in another door stopper, just in case the first one fails. Keith holds on to the act for a good five minutes while placing a hand on the door. He reverts back to how he came to Lance’s apartment and he glows with the door. There was crash from the door, but because of the door stoppers and whatever Keith is doing to the door, it held its ground. It was silent for a bit before Keith spoke up again “You should wash those because it's still toxic once... they... leave” Keith doesn't really finish the sentence because he's sliding to the floor.

“Woah, Keith” Lance and Shiro is running up to Keith just to see that all of the rose petals melt into the blood. The scent of vanilla and roses grew stale and the metallic scent of blood kicks Lance's nose. Then it clicks. If it wasn't for Keith and whatever he did, the both of them would have been dead or worse. Keith at this point is at worse for wear. He was taking short, ragged breaths. The injuries that he sustained was still there but it wasn't bleeding as bad as it was before. This Keith was tired and wore down. He passed out before Lance could even ask him how he did it. Platinum Keith becomes freckled, inky haired Keith in Lance’s arms without all of the extra stuff.

“We need to work fast. He’s not gonna last any longer than this, especially since he overexerted himself to the core.” Shiro picks Keith up and takes him to the living room. He lays him down and starts to open the large bag to remove things that Lance didn’t have originally.

“Wait woah, we are doing it here?” Lance asks

“Yes? Why not?” Shiro shrugs as he continues to empty the contents of his bag. Lance continues to stare at him. There are a few things that were taken out that Lance didn’t understand, like the matchbox. Lance would have to wait and see about that one.

“He needs actual doctors. We are just interns.”

“When you really grasp the situation, can you really bring Keith to a hospital knowing that he is not exactly human” Shiro has a point. There is a lot of things that could go wrong if they when with the logical route. “It would make sense to have Allura to do this, but she is off the land for a bit”

“Off the Land?” Lance asked. With the rate of things is going, if it keeps at this pace or speeds up, Lance is gonna have fit. Shiro should be able to pick this up, but he doesn’t. Lance doesn’t even know if Shiro is human or not. All he wants are answers to his questions.

“I’ll explain later.“ Lance doesn’t get his answers here. He gets the feeling that he will get his answers but not in the way he will like. “Here” Shiro hands him a needle and thread. Lance gives him an odd look. He knows exactly where each and every one of these come from.

“You want me to stitch him up?”

“You have steadier hands than me. You will be able to do this better than I can. I’ll clean the wounds and you stitch. I’ll place ointment and bandage him up. ”

“WE ARE INTERNS SHIRO, IN-TERNS” Lance stresses this out. They just gotten accepted into that particular program a few weeks ago that allows interns to work closely with doctors and surgeons. Who knows what could happen if they were figured out by the board.

“Lance, I know, but we can't leave him like this.” They both look at Keith on the coffee table. From the looks of things, he is with an inch of his life as of now.

“We could get caught and arrested for stealing. That’s a fel here, Shiro” Lance places his hands in his hands. It felt too much was going on. First, platinum Keith, then the police/monster/whatever tore his door, and now this. Everything has become this whirlwind of confusion for Lance and all he wants is to wish this away like a bad dream. Shiro places his hand on Lance’s shoulder and squeezes reassurance to him.

“I’ll take full responsibility if that’s the case. We still need to help him.” Lance had a weak resolve from the beginning. There was no way he was going to allow Keith to slip through his fingers like that. That wasn’t happening. After all, there were questions that both Shiro and Keith are going to need to answer. Lance sighs before looking back at Shiro with a face made with resolve and new vigor. He examines the items that Shiro had placed on three plates.

“Did you bring morphine or anesthetic?”

“I brought both with Chlorhexidine”

“Okay, let's start quickly before he catches an infection,“ Lance said as the both of them began their long patch up.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Its time for transportation because somebody forgot someone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, I'm back. I'm not sure if I'll be able to work and post chapters since the semester is up running again.  
> This isn't beta'd so I apologize.
> 
> Enjoy :)

Seventy-five stitches in an hour. They had to pause because they ran out of thread and Shiro had to run back out to get more. Lance hopes that he doesn’t get caught taking it. That would have been of a whole mess right there. It was a good thing that he got the right type of thread but underestimated how much. Now that Lance thinks about it, he never told Shiro about the type of wounds that Keith has as of late. Would that make him inhuman too? 

Shiro always knew where to be at the right time. Not that it sets alarms in Lance’s head, but it does throw some form of a red flag. Like that time he asked Lance to move two seats away from him in a movie theater. Lance looks at him with an odd look and moves anyway. Right after he did, his chair that he was just sitting on was now sitting on the ceiling. The ushers, after evacuating everyone from the theater afterward, told them that the water valve had burst from underneath the building.

Understanding that the world works in mysterious ways, but that isn’t what the phrase was used for. Not for the multiple freak accidents that happen after meeting Shiro a couple of years back. They started to grow more frequent ever since Keith came in that summer. He was an odd child back in the summer. He would only wear either a long sleeve sweater or a leather jacket in the long blistering days all day. Lance worries about him passing out from heatstroke and made it an everyday thing to carry at least four iced bottles of water just for Keith, especially when the temperatures had surpassed one hundred degrees. 

The last dwindling days of the summer heat, Keith had come to the beach with a lighter jacket and a jacket. That was when Lance saw a hint of ink over his neck moved as the sea wind brushes them. He didn’t mention it because they barely spoke but just stared at it. He thought that it was odd enough that it moved in the first place. That was one of the rare times where he actually saw Keith’s tatts. Other than that it was just glimpsed and an entire arm that other time.

Lance looks over at Keith’s back to look at the ink to see nothing. His arms and neck were bare of such beautiful ink. The only thing that he noticed that he was freckled from head to toe. Lance wonders if there are more people like Keith if they are evil or good.

“You’re think too loud.” Lance perks up at the faint call of his name and jumps to Keith side. When he gets to his side he gently pushes Keith’s hair away from his face so that he could see Lance’s face better. Lance could feel the stickiness of Keith hair and suspects head trauma. He addresses Keith to make sure he is still with the living.

“Keith?” Lance asked softly, taking into an account that he may be concussed. Keith opens his eyes briefly and closes them just as quickly.

“Don’t you remember me?”

“Uh... yeah? We met last summer, don’t you remember”

“That’s... not what... I was... referring...” Keith said and he was gone again. That made Lance look at Keith funny. The first time he saw him was that summer, Shiro was the one who introduced him to Keith. Then again, he did see glimpses of Keith around the campus during the spring semester.

Lance looks at his handy work. It's not the greatest but it’s enough to keep them closed, not to mention that he had to watch a youtube video about how to do it out of sheer fear of screwing up. It had come to Lance’s attention that he hasn’t checked all of Keith’s injuries, only the ones that are out there were treated. When Lance did a full diagnosis on Keith, he realizes that there were more wounds than he originally thought. There were more scrapes and cuts around his arms and legs. There were more cuts on his right side of his face, but that can be glued. There was so much that Lance missed that the moment that Shiro entered the apartment he turns to him.

“You don't happen to have any glue in that bag?” Lance called out.

“I have that, a boot and an arm sling. I also brought more bandages and Band-Aids” Shiro said without missing a beat. Lance raises an eyebrow.

“I already have those?”

“They aren't going to last long” They kept it at that. They emptied the contents of the bag again and when back to patch up.

One hundred and twenty-five more stitches in an hour and fifteen minutes later. The worst of the cuts were sealed, cleaned and bandaged up. The biggest one took way more time. The one thing that Lance thought was odd was how clean the cuts were. Not that it was a problem or anything but it's too clean. It was something that he was wondering as he finished the last stitch for the shoulder for Shiro to put some ointment on.

Fifty stitches in twenty minutes. Lance was getting faster at this. Shiro was right again about grabbing more bandages because he ran out of his supplies. Lance moves on to the face.

Ten yards of bandages in thirty minutes. The time reads six twenty-one. There was no way Lance was going to class, especially when there a test today. He should at least send an email as to why he's not coming in today so that he'll be able to make it up. He cuts the rest of the bandage off from Keith's foot and tucks it in. He takes the boot from the bag and puts it on. 

One large and two small Band-Aids in three minutes and they are done. Lance is going to have a fit the moment Keith wakes up. He's going to curse him out for scaring him like this and throttle him until he understands not to do something again. (He will not)

“You should get some sleep,” Shiro said after some time after moving Keith to the couch with such caution and care. They can't afford to open the cuts on his back. Lance was on his phone, sending an email to his professor after washing his hands.

“Can't. Need to clean the trail and puddle” Lance points to the mess and Shiro visibly flinches. Lance isn't so sure to show him his room, where the real horror starts. There was a metallic odor in the air Lance doesn't have the energy to even begin with cleaning.

“I'll do it,” Shiro said. He begins to walk towards the kitchen and takes out a bucket, Clorox, and a sponge.

“Are you sure? Because of it a lot of work and it's a large trail to my room”

“I'll be fine”

“Not to mention you been up all night with me doing this.”

“Lance trust me. I'll be fine”

“Okay then,” Lance said. He places both his laptop and phone on a charger. Lance notices that Keith began to shiver and breaks out into a cold sweat. He goes to a closet to bring two blankets, one for Keith and one for himself. He places one on Keith and lays in the couch adjacent to Keith.

“How come you are sleeping here?” Shiro asks. Lance shakes his head as he falls into a restless slumber. He could faintly hear Shiro sigh and mumbles 'wash your face’ but he decided to ignore it.

-_-_-

_-_-_

Lance slowly wakes up to a chemical floral scent. He recalls that he doesn't have any cleaning products that smell like that and grows uneasy. He slowly rises to see a sleeping figure on his couch. Lance almost jumps out if his skin when he sees the figure covered in both a blanket and bandages. ‘This sleeping figure is Keith, right’ Lance thought as the past few hours runs back him. He gets to check up on Keith to see that there are a thermometer and a cloth placed on his forehead. 

“He’s running a fever?” Lance asks but receives nothing in return. He turns on the thermometer to see the last check was an hour ago at hundred degrees. Lance's eyebrows crunch up. Of all thing, Keith shouldn't be running a fever. Not now. Lance takes the warm cloth off of him and rolls the thermometer across his forehead. It beeps with a yellow screen while reading one hundred and one point five. Keith winces to the sound.

‘That’s not good’ Lance thought as he rushes to the sink and runs the cloth in cool water and places it back. Not before pushing his hair away from his face. Keith looks peaceful in his sleep, but that's because he all drugged up with morphine. 'I think that's a good thing’ Lance thought as he readjusts Keith's blanket.

He looks around to see that his flat is spotless. There was nothing out of place. He runs to his room to see that everything is put where it's supposed to be. Except for his clothes and mattress, where it's missing as of late. He should be freaking out right now because mattresses don't just get up leave just like that, but with the night he just had this was just a tickle in the brain. He looks at the dresser to see that the clothes that were originally missing were just placed back in its place all washed, including the ones that were covering the door. 

Lance remembers that Shiro offered to clean but, he knows that he didn't mean the entire apartment. Although Lance is grateful, he feels bad. He would have to repay Shiro for this. Lance looks at the dresser again to realize that something was missing. 

There was supposed to be a necklace with blue and red charms hanging loosely on a picture frame. Upon inspection, the picture in the frame is missing as well. Lance starts to freak out, the necklace was supposedly handed down from his great grandfather all the way to him. Lance runs to the kitchen, hoping that he may have left it there with the first aid kit. That's was when Shiro pops into the room. Literally. With groceries. Lance's eyebrows would have been hitting the moon if they weren't too busy being pulled down.

“Oh, hey, Lance. I wanted to let you know-” Lance cuts him off.

“Do you know where the necklace and picture is? The one in my room.” Shiro lifts an eyebrow.

“I know I moved the necklace to your nightstand but, there the picture frame was empty when I saw it,” Shiro said. Lance rakes his hair.

“It's not empty there's a picture in there” Shiro shrugs as he moves towards the kitchen. With that, Lance bolts to the room and towards the nightstand to see the necklace there. Lance give out a sigh of relief when he also sees the half picture. He takes both of them out and places them in their rightful place. 

The necklace is a gold chain that held a blue charm and a red charm. From what he could remember, the charms represent fire and water. Although, the red one was an additional charm that was given to him from a forgotten friend. Lance can't remember for the life of him who that friend was, the only thing that remembers was that and the half picture that was also given to him. The picture portrays a younger Lance with party paint all over his face and with an arm slung over him. The one thing stood out about the arm was that there were white feathers painted all over the pale arm. 

Lance decides that a shower could help in clearing his mind. So he does that to rinse himself from the hours before. The heated shower works to an extent, his mind begins to wander to the pale arm with the painted feathers. Now that he starts to remember, his memories are a bit jumbled up. He doesn't really remember most of his childhood. Yes, he did have good times with his family and such but that was it. That was up until his mother passed away from an illness a few months ago without telling him to find his dear friend. 

He realizes that these shower thoughts was doing much more harm than good. His mind was doing 1600 meters in a second in his head. There are more questions that are piling up to the point where the shower has begun to feel like a heavy downpour on his head. Lance turns it off and heads out to his room.

Lance emerges from his room, after some time, with clean clothes and his laptop. He goes over to the kitchen area to see that a plate of food was prepared for him. He takes that and goes over to where Shiro was sitting, right next to Keith. Lance begins to dig in.

“How’s Keith?” Lance asks while munching on a piece of toast. Shiro glances at Keith with worry when he speaks up.

“He’s running a 102 fever as of late and I can’t get it down long enough. It’s been steadily rising ever since you last checked.” Shiro said as he replaces the cloth that was sitting on Keith's forehead with a cooler one. The time reads one twenty-four. He's been asleep since four and there is no change. Lance rakes his hair, food was slightly being forgotten.

“I was afraid of that. It looks like one of the wounds got infected. At the same time, we did an impromptu suture for three hours with a thirty-minute break to get more supplies.” That made Shiro cross his arms while holding his chin.

“We just got to figure out what kind of infection it is” 

“Is it Cellulitis, or is there abscess forming on any of the wounds?” Lance asks. 

“I changed his Bandages twice, its not either of those.” Lance go over to Keith and checks his pulse and breathing.

“Shiro, I think its sepsis” Shiro gives him a skeptical look before speaking up.

“How can you be sure about that?”

“Check this out, he has a high fever as of late, rapid breathing, and when you check his pulse its-” Shiro takes Keith other hand and checks for himself.

“Over ninety beats per minute,” Shiro finishes Lance sentence and curses.

“What can we do? We can’t leave him like this or he’ll go into a sepsis shock and that's a real mess on our hands if that happens.” Lance is pacing at this point. Shiro is watching both Keith and Lance. Both of them with concern.

“I know, I know, but I can’t take a whole antibacterial IV from there or I’ll get caught” Lance double takes to that as he comes to a full stop. Shiro winces for Lance's neck.

“Wait, woah, what do you mean?” Lance speech gets a bit jumbled up with how fast he's talking, but he can't help it. “By 'getting caught’”

“As of now, they are making a count of all of their supplies. They are going to notice a few of the drugs are missing, especially the morphine and anesthetic. If I go anytime throughout the week then they will pin it on me”

“How do you know that? How were you able to get these items with ease in the first place? More importantly, where did these come from?” Shiro uses his hands to try to calm Lance down. It doesn't really help since Lance is working himself up. Especially since Lance is in mid-freakout.

“The hospital that we intern at has broken cameras as of late and the security guard wasn’t on duty. I just sneak my way in, took what I needed and left.” Lance crouches down and holds his head in his hand and screams.

“What are we going to do? Keith needs an actual doctor that is qualified and if-” Shiro places his hands on Lance's shoulder and sighs.

“Hey, hey let's not jump to conclusions. We can figure this out together.” Lance hears a loud thud. He lifts his head to see Shiro across the room, empty the contents of his bag. Lance didn't even hear Shiro get up. Let alone walk over to his bag, which was across the room past a sleeping Keith. Lance walks over to Shiro, he can him muttering the phrase ‘I’m an idiot’ like a broken record. Lance is tempted to actually record it since his phone is in his pocket, but he knows from experience that would be poor judgment on his part.

“Wait, why? And how did you move without making a sound?” Shiro was on autopilot now. He's removing spools of yarn from his bag and moving over towards Keith. Lance is hot on his tail.

“Coran, I forgot about Coran.” Lance shoots him an incredulous look. His hands were moving frantically.

“Who’s Coran?” Shiro throws Lance his bookbag. He looks at the offended object skeptically. “Are we leaving?”

“Yes, take extra clothes with you.” Lance is sprinting to his room, grabbing from hoodies to sweatpants and throwing them in there. He looks at the chain and decides to take it with him as he places it over his neck. He takes his charger for both his laptop and phone and heads over to the living room. He's lidding his laptop and wallet into his bag when he realiz-

“How are we taking Keith? He is currently out of commission and we can’t move him without aggravating the stitches.” Shiro, however, has plans for that as he walks over to Keith with his bag. He places a rather large matchbox from earlier on top of the coffee table and opens it. The contents of the matchbox are of a tiny pillow, bedding, and a blanket. Lance is in a state of confusion as he observes.

“Keith?” Shiro said as softly as he could. Lance walks over to see how Shiro was going to solve this problem.

“Keith’s high off of Morphine, I don’t think anything you do will wo-” Against all of the odds, Keith begins to open his eyes. Lance's eyes begin to pop right out as he rushes to Keith's side. The only questions that are running through his mind are the five W's and How.

“Yeah?” Keith said. His voice was barely there. Lance's mind is exploding as they speak. The questions are rapidly running around his mind is starting to make him nauseous.

“Good Night, Keith” Keith begins to glow faint red as he begins to shrinks. Shiro cups his hands as he catches Keith's tiny form. 

“Good Night, Shiro” Keith goes right back to sleep as Shiro tucks Keith in the matchbox. Shiro even goes in places a cotton ball just to keep Keith's sprained foot levitated. He places the cover over Keith, just above his chest. Shiro then places the box inside the bookbag and added a half made scarf on top before zipping the bag shut. 

Lance is losing his mind at this point. First, it's Platinum Keith pops up to his place as some off-scripted Bloody Mary, then the impromptu patch up with Shiro, then realizing that he used to have a mattress, then Keith catching an infection, and then TINY KEITH. His brain can't process all of this in such a short period of time. It's just too much. Shiro doesn't really catch to Lance's inner drama as he puts his coat on.

“Okay, are we ready to go?” He asks like everything is normal.

“Are we read- WHAT WAS THAT!? HOW IN THE FRESH H-” Lance was pacing again, but he realizes that they don't really have that kind of time for that. So he begins to slip his sneakers on and his coat. “You know what, I want answers to all of this. Especially for that” He points to the bag. Shiro sighs and puts the bag on and takes all of his other things and opens the door.

“And you’ll get them in due time. Now let’s go, we can’t waste any more time.” Shiro leaves through the door. Lance stand in place for a bit before getting his bag and keys and slamming the door shut

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure if I'll be able to post chapters because of my classes and such.
> 
> Until Next time:
> 
> [My Tumblr](https://www.stop-klancing-around.tumblr.com)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance and Shiro take a trip to Coran's place with a few bumps along the road. Literally. Also, some answers are revealed as new ones arise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A chapter and a fic in one day? A miracle on my part. Also, can I scream about over 500 Hits on this fic? Thank you soo much for reading this!!!!
> 
> This isn't beta'd yet so an apology in advance if you see any errors.
> 
> Enjoy :)

Time felt like someone was pouring honey all over Lance. It begins with pouring very slowly and builds up speed. Afterward, things start to get sticky. Before you know it, there’s a mess, there’s no more honey, and every it’s all over the place. Just like time, it sticks to you once it starts and when it’s done, you're stuck with the mess that it made. Time is mainly the pouring part of the honey for Lance and Shiro this situation. While Keith is that sticky part of the time. Both of them, however, are trying to clean the mess up.

 

Currently, Shiro is driving Lance’s car with Lance in the passenger’s seat with Shiro’s bag where you guessed it, Keith inside sleeping. It has been two hours since they left Lance’s apartment. Since that time, they have managed to run two stop signs and one red light. Lance is in due for a large mental breakdown with the past twelve hours he’s been having. He’s been screaming at Shiro for the past thirty minutes about the bang-up driving he was doing. Especially with all of the breaking of the driving rules that been hammered in them since high school.

 

“SHIRO, SLOW THE HELL DOWN. WE COU- OH FOR FUCK’S SAKE, STOP AND LET ME DRIVE.” Lance was growing tired of the reckless driving. At this point, if they get pulled over it’s all on Lance’s license and he doesn’t want to explain to Hunk on how he got another point on his license. Now, that he’s thinking about it, he doesn’t know how to explain anything of this to Hunk. If only someONE gave hi-

 

“You can not, under any circumstance, tell anyone about this” Lance snaps his head to Shiro in with fear and fear alone. He just read his thoughts and interrupted it. Just like that.

 

“How in the-” Shiro cuts him off before he could really grasp what’s going on. He swerves right.

 

“I’ll explain this al-” Lance knew what was he was going to say. He waves his hand at Shiro and looks out the window. 

 

“Later. Yes, yes, I know that, but you aren’t giving me anything.” He looks down at the bag where Keith is. “I don’t think I can keep doing this without answers” Lance understands that he needs to do this, but he can’t continue to do this blindly. Not at the rate that this situation is going. Shiro side-eyes him and thinks for a bit. He sighs after coming to a conclusion in his head.

 

“Tell you what, I will answer any question you have once we get to Coran's. Okay?” Lance crosses his arms with a huff and slouches down. He's still annoyed but at least there's a bit of a promise.

 

“Okay. But let me drive.” Shiro gives him a face. He speeds up.

 

“How come you’re asking? You gave me the keys because said and I quote ‘You know how to get there better than me.’” Shiro uses a hand to finger quote, Lance. At least his eyes are facing the road.

 

“I understand that we are in a hurry but, with the way you're driving, we’re gonna get pulled over” Lance raises his voice a bit while buckling up. He wasn’t dying, but it sure feels like it. 

 

“No we're-” Right on cue, Shiro runs a red light and swerve into a turnpike. Lance was screeching through it all while one hand is squeezing the bag and another was clenching the handle on the car. The handle pops off immediately. Lance is praying that Keith is still in that hazy sleep. If he's not dead from Lance’s death grip on the bag. “Hey, hey, don't squeeze the bag like that” Shiro had the audacity to tap Lance with a hand. That hand should be on the damn wheel not finding a way to cause bodily harm on Lance.

 

“THEN STOP DRIVING LIKE THIS” Lance finds something else to grab on to, like the dashboard. He also puts his seatbelt on and immediately pulls it all out activate the child’s lock. 

 

“You don't even need the seatbelt, Lance,” Shiro said that like he wasn't hitting a hundred and twenty on a sixty-five highway.

 

“With the way you're driving, I'm gonna need an additional one with a waiver.” The only thing that Lance did was a blink and Shiro makes the most hardest right straight into the woods. If Lance wasn't screaming now, he was surely cursing Shiro out in Spanish about how he was going to die. With the all of the sharp jerks of the car, Lance was praying that they don't hit a tree. Lance's long line of screams, dies as he looks out the window. He double-takes, they was driving solely on dirt, rocks, and woods. A flash of eyes makes a quick glimpse at the passenger mirror and disappears. 

 

“Where are we?” The sky gets increasingly dark with every jolt of the car. Lance turns on the car lights. “Are we in the woods?” Lance knows it's a very stupid question, but his mind can't comprehend that they are deep into the woods. Even after a full minute of just swerving what could have been a tree.

 

“Yep,” Shiro pops the ‘p’. He changes the gears on the car and slows down. Lance is grateful for the decrease in speed but is starting to call bullshit.

 

“How did we get this deep into the woods?” Lance sticks his head out from the car just to see just dirt and gravel. He swiftly puts it back in the car so that low hanging branches wouldn't give him a high two in the face. Lance looks back. “I can barely see the city.” He looks closely at his surroundings. The trees in the area are dancing in a furious state, but there is no wind to back it up. He sticks his hand out to feel no wind hitting his hand. That was odd to Lance. “Why are the trees moving like that?”

 

“Coran's place only answers to those in need. The forest protects Coran and everyone and thing that enters it. The only thing, however, it takes from them is a bit of your mind.” Shiro looks focused on the road.

 

“Oh okay then.” Lance raises his hands and lets him be. Shiro has gotten them this far without killing them, the most Lance could do is to keep Keith safe. He begins to watch the scene in front of him. The trees and bushes were in an infinite dance with the wind, besides interchanging position when passed by. It was dark and glowing eyes began to glow faintly through the forest. To Lance instead of the haunting, creepy feeling that certain forest give when one walks alone, there's a calm and soothing atmosphere here. Almost as if the forest is as one being.

 

“Shiro?” Lance speaks up after some time. Shiro hums to acknowledge being spoken to. His eyes are glued to the window shield. “What exactly is this forest?”

 

“I actually don't know anything about this forest. All I know is that Coran is associated with this place.” Shiro said. Lance nods his head to that.

 

“Does Keith or this Coran dude knows this place?”

 

“Keith does. He knows the ‘mother of the forest’ as he stated.” Shiro finger quotes “As for Coran, I don't know. You'll need to ask him that.” Lance could hear something stir in the bushes. It does not feel right to Lance. It felt off. 

 

“Can this forest... Talk?” Lance ask.

 

“This forest is strange nonetheless. You'll hear voices anywhere.” Shiro said it without missing a beat. 

 

“Can you hear them?” Shiro's eyebrows slightly move. He looks troubled by the question. Lance was about to take it back when he speaks up.

 

“Yes, but I can only hear what it wants me to hear. This forest is bound by the Mother. Only they could change the crafts of the leaves.” It sounded more wistful than just. It becomes silent afterward with the exception of the leaves mumbling its tune. Lance closes his eyes to hear better. Block out the sight of the bag and the car. He begins to feel the presence of something around him.

 

“ _ Paladin _ ” It starts with a single faint, hollow voice that multiplies. First into a calm, then annoyed, and without a doubt caution. They came in with a warm feeling. They kept repeating 'paladin’ with increased intensity, however. It was all screams with different emotions. One with fear, one with anger, one with hope. It didn't matter because they were all screaming like the damned.

 

“Stop!” Lance screams as he covers his ears. The screams of the damned stops, but callused hands hold his face with care as they lifted his head up. Lance opens his eyes to see nothing. Looks around and there’s nothing, but something is holding his head. He could feel one of its rough fingers caressing his cheeks. He notices that he’s sitting on a very old tree root that appears to run far and deep into the woods. Not the Camry that is currently taking a beating somewhere in the woods. The large tree behind him is still in its prime despite it looking old and battered. He can feel something caressing his cheeks. “Where are you?” he asks.

 

“ _ A Paladin with sealed eyes, how troublesome. Your eyes will be the one that buries you with pure lilies and tainted forget-me-nots if not fixed. _ ” The voices spoke up again. Albeit sounding more annoyed than calm. There are still several voices that are present, it wasn’t as intense as they were when calling out ‘paladin’. 

 

“What do you mean by that” Lance speaks up. There was a burst of murmurings after his sentence before coming to a halt. Lance could feel a hot presence right on his shoulder. 

 

“ _ Your keeper has surfaced and sits on your shoulder” _ Lance looks to his shoulder but only see a white and faint red flame. The flame feels familiar, but he doesn't want to name it just yet. “ _ Break his seal O ye blessed first. _ ” The static whispers to the flames before becoming quiet. To Lance, it felt like he wasn't supposed to hear that. There’s a vague sense of intention with that as if they wanted for Lance to know about this.  _ “Come back to me when you are ready to contact her.” _  The voices begin to fade out with a snap. Within that space, the tree and everything around it begins to warp and spiral up. Within the last moments of the space collapsing, he could hear something whisper into his ear.

 

“Speak nothing of this space.” This voice was Keith as he floats into Lance's view with the same flame aura that was on his shoulder. The only thing that was different about this Keith was that he looks frail. The aura that's around him isn't as bright and hot as it was. It feels like a dying flame in a rainstorm. He looked tired and was fading with space. Lance wanted to ask Keith about how to get out of this space, but Keith already on that. With the snap of his fingers, Lance is thrust back into the car. He gasps and grabs ahold of the dashboard and the bag tightly as the car comes to a full stop.

 

“And we are here?” Shiro sounded like he was asking Lance if this was the place. Lance, however, his panting as he is looking around the car. He opens the bag to see Keith in his matchbox bed, still fighting whilst his faint, rapid breathing. Lance looks at his hands to see that there's a vague glow on his fingertips disappearing. “Lance? Are you okay?”

 

“Yeah? I’m cool.” The way Lance was clutching the bag or the way or the small looks outside the window could have been a dead giveaway. That's when Shiro caught ebbing smoke on Lance's hair, slipping away and into the bag. He sighs and opens the car door.

 

“Leave it to Keith to save you even when death is knocking on his door,” Shiro said as he slams the door. Lance made a face before walking out of the car as well before taking the bag with him. 

 

They trek towards an old rickety home with cobwebs that's was larger than Shiro's head. There's were holes in the windows and floorboards. The place doesn't sit well with Lance. Especially with the whole forest space shitshow earlier, he's not so keen on trying to enter into random abandoned place at the moment.

 

“Are you sure we are at the right place?” Shiro doesn't answer him. He instead makes a beat with the door. There was a total of nine knocks at the door. Lance was about to ask Shiro is he has lost his damn mind when an eccentric man with orange hair burst out the door.

 

“Ah, Shiro, what brings you here?” He studies Lance for a bit before stepping right into his personal space. Lance takes a large step back. “And who is this fellow here?” The enthusiasm within his voice was invigorating. It almost made Lance forget about why was here in the first place. Almost. 

 

"I’m Lance?” The man with the orange hair extends his hand. Lance takes his hand and receives a warm, firm handshake. The word firm was just a nice way to say for such a vigorous handshake.

 

“Well, Lance Serrano, it is certainly a pleasure to meet you for the time being. My name is Coran Hieronymus Wimbleton Smythe” The orange hair man quickly ushers them inside and shut the door.  

 

“How di-” He shouldn't be asking that question with all of the things that's been going on. The worst part is that it hasn't been a full twenty-four hours yet. A better question would have been being ‘what the fuck kind of name is that’. Coran gave Lance an offended look before continuing. Lance should feel bad if he heard that but he can't bring himself to.

 

“I am a Medic, Lance. Your jacket has your last name I assume.” Lance is wearing an old varsity jacket with his last name with it. It kinda made Lance feel silly for the question he was going to ask. He nods at Coran. “Shiro, is it Keith again?” 

 

“Yes, it is,” Shiro said. Coran begins to walk towards larger, pristine doors and gestures for both of them to follow him. Now that Lance was inside, he begins to notice that the outside was all but a lie. The place is bigger than what it looks outside. 

 

Everything was this off white in color with weird patterns that surrounded each door that he could see. There were grand hallways that led towards larger doors. What baffles Lance was the stairs that led upwards to doors that could house great beasts from the unknown. Just what is this place and what is for? Lance wonders.

 

“Again?” Coran questions. “What's going on? This is the seventh time this month” Lance eye widens. The rest kept a neutral face although with a hint of a fear that dust their eyes.

 

“The fact that he said again, AGAIN” How many times does Keith come home like this? Does he always come to Shiro and this Coran dude like this with an inch of his life? These questions began a furious spiral in Lance's head.

 

They enter a large room with clinical walls. There were wires hooked up to monitors, computers, beds, and a few monster-sized cylinders in the corner. The biggest thing in the room was the screen that was facing them. It took up the entire wall with smaller screens surrounding it. The room gave Lance a whiplash. Before, the house itself was this old, weather-battered, and abandoned. This isn't what the house supposed to look like. The smell of the room is what catches Lance off guard. The lingering smells of bleach and anesthetics, just like a hospital.

 

“What’s wrong with him this time?” Coran takes the bag and takes out the matchbox out with care. He then pulls out the matchbox to see the full extent of Keith. Coran hisses while taking him out the tiny box and into a bed that is 20x too big for his size. Hopefully, Shiro can resize him so that he can fit the bed better. “I see that he's patched up already?” Coran speaks as he changes Keith into a gown. There was caution with the way he handles Keith as he guides his arms through the holes of the gown.

 

“Yeah we patched him but, but we suspected that he has sepsis as of late” Lance said. Coran nods in agreement. He places a tiny pillow under Keith's boot.

 

“That's right number three. Number Four is a bit warm to the touch” Lance blinks to that. He’s a number? Since when was he assigned one?

 

“Number three?” Lance points towards himself. Coran scurries off somewhere to come back with a tiny washcloth and lays it on top of Keith's forehead.

 

“Yes. Number three, Shiro is the tallest out of us as of now.”

 

“But my name is Lance.” 

 

“Back to the subject at hand.” Coran put a few thick blankets on Keith to cover him from the cold. Lance pouts when he doesn't get the answer that he wants. He walks over to a chair on the other side of Keith and sits. “Shiro, why didn't you call me when this happened?” Coran runs back to the back a brings back an IV drip and stand. He begins to hook Keith onto it with all of the other good stuff. How Coran has equipment for Keith’s tiny size baffles Lance. Where is all of this coming from in the first place? 

 

“We live nowhere near the vicinity of this place.” They both had a point, Lance thought. There was a good chance that this would have been cleared up if this was all thought through. Then again, both Lance and Shiro are med students. Who thinks straight when something like this happens?

 

“I believe that I gave all of you a porter ring so that if anything happens you can think, twist and teleport you here or other places. It can take up to five people at a time.” Coran said without missing a beat. It was Lance’s turn to look at Shiro with astonishment and annoyance. He props his elbow on the bed to place his head on his hand. The trip that could have taken at least a second or so took three hours and over. He could have saved on gas and a beat down of his car.

 

“I don't have it.” That made Coran stop in his tracks. “It's with Adam, he's repairing it as of late.” He turns around and looks at Shiro. Lance leans away from the bed because the atmosphere dropped. There is this dark, tense mood that dropped suddenly and heavily on Lance. It felt like he was suffocating and his fight or flight sense triggered. And it's telling him to run and take Keith with him. He looks down to see that Keith could feel energy drop too with the way his face is twisting up in pain. He begins to grasp the sheets. Lance looks up at Coran again. 

 

“Word of advice Shiro.” Coran’s voice dropped a pitch in tone. Fear begins to grip Lance and tighten its hold on him as he stood in place. Shiro on the other hand, stood still. Very still. “Don't let this happen again or you'll be dealing with more than just this over your head.” Coran had a small glint to his eyes. It was a warning that shouldn’t be tested again. “Is that clear?”

 

“I-” Shiro flinches. Lance could see tiny fear flakes in Shiro’s shoulders. He takes a deep breath and sighs. He doesn't look Coran in the eye. “Yes, Coran.”  

 

“Moving right along, I want to know who did the stitching on Keith” The air changes once again from the suffocating tension to light-hearted freedom, just like before. Lance could feel himself breath again as he slouches down. Keith's face goes back to a more peaceful sleep. It's better than what it was before. 

 

Coran goes right back to tending Keith while mumbling something an along the lines of 'blank hates it when I do that’. Shiro, however, goes to a wall and slides down to the floor. He looks drained from that tiny ordeal. What just happened? Lance decides to dub this as the air room because he has never in his twenty years of living has he seen such a thing.

 

“Lance did the stitching. I only cleaned and placed ointment afterward.” Shiro’s words had taken Lance out of his mind and into reality. He looks at Coran and expects the same faith as Shiro, a verbal execution from someone that refers to him a number.

 

“You did an excellent job on this.” Was what he said. It took Lance off guard and a whiplash. “Careful my boy, don’t want to catch a sprained neck.”

 

“Uhhhhh. Thank yo-” Coran cuts him off. Again.

 

“But-” Coran waves his hand for Lance to come over. Lance moves over like his life depended on it. Coran points to the stitches that were on Keith’s tiny back. Lance had to squint to see his work and what Coran is referring to. “You should keep in mind that the stitches aren’t even in spacing. Always keep that in mind, Lance. Also, another thing to keep in mind that you should keep in mind is time. Keep to a minimum of two hours when doing this. Other than that, you did a great job on this.” This made Lance feel slightly good about his work. Not really good, but enough for him to keep going for a bit.

 

“Coran, are we able to get him in a pod?” Shiro asks. Coran shakes his head as his shoulders drop.

 

“I'm afraid not. The pods have been acting strange for the past few days. I've called the technician and engineer for troubleshooting but they're busy with their own lives.” Coran said. Shiro frowns to that.

 

“How long have these been down?” 

 

“For the past week.” Coran begins to walk towards Shiro. Lance follows him. “I may have to go through and use the crystals, but Keith never reacted well with them.” Shiro curses and thinks for a bit. He shakes his head with a defeated sigh.

 

“Do we have any crystals?” Shiro’s voice was strained with frustration. Something that Lance can and will relate to. 

 

“Yes and no. We have enough for only his back and a part of his shoulder.” Shiro curses again as he puts his head in his hands. Shiro seems all wounded from just crystals?

 

“It's better than nothing then. I just don’t want to see him in that state either.” The room feels warmer than it was before. It has a snug comforting air, like when blankets come straight from the dryer and on the bed to sleep under. 

 

“No one does Shiro. I understand that.” Coran looks at Keith again. “I’ll need him in full size.” Shiro walks towards them. Lance frowns and points to the bed.

 

“But the clothes? And all of the other stuff that’s hooked up to him?” Lance asks. He was more concerned about Keith accidentally choking on his tiny gown. Coran smiles sweetly at Lance.

 

“Don’t worry, everything will expand with him. The tiny incident will not rear its ugly head twice.” Coran says it like it has happened before. Multiple times at that. Shiro mumbles out a few things and Keith grows back to his original size with the promise of his gown growing with him. It's something that Lance will not be able to get used to anytime soon. “Would you mind tossing me that jar to your left, my boy?”

 

“Sure?” Lance look at the direction to see the glass jar with the contents all fuzzy. It was strange, there are definite shapes in the jar, but it feels like it's being censored from his eyes. When he picks it up, he could hear something jangle inside. Lance shakes it gently to hear that there was something in there. He begins to wonder if this is what the woods meant by ‘sealed eyes’, but discards it quickly. There was no need to think that if he could see clearly with the ones present.  

 

“Do you see it?” That knocks him back into reality. Lance speeds in Coran’s side with the jar.

 

“Here, although it's fuzzy inside.”

 

“What do you mean? There are only four crystals in here.” Coran takes one of them out to for Lance to see. All Lance could see was static snow that he was holding. He shrugs, not wanting to prolong this any longer. Coran looks at Lance a bit longer with a puzzled face before turning back to the issue at hand.

 

“Shiro, can you give me a hand with Keith? I need to flip him over.” Shiro comes over and with the help of Lance, they all get him on his side. Coran decided that flipping him all the way over would be too much on Keith. Especially since the morphine is beginning to wear off as of late. 

 

Coran begins to place two ‘crystals’ on Keith’s back and claps his hands together. He then quickly begins to slather on the static snow goo all over the stitches while Keith writhes and grunts. Shiro holds him down while being mindful of his shoulder. The method is repeated again while this time the after spreading the goo, Coran bandages Keith up again. Shiro runs to the back just to return with more blankets. Both of them places three thick blankets on Keith before calling it done. They worked effortlessly and efficiently as a team. The only thing Lance could have done was watch. He knows that if he was to join, he would have screwed something up. 

 

“I’m not really sure when he’ll be awake. I’m going to give a rough estimation of a couple of hours to two days max since we are using crystals.” Coran said as he tosses the gloves into the trash. 

 

“What can we do during the meantime, can we leave and pick him up later?” Lance ask. Coran whips his head towards Lance in shock.

 

“Oh, no, neither of you can leave until Keith is conscious?” Coran said. Lance eyes beings to bug out.

 

“What!? Why not?” Lance is irritated.

 

“You are to enter and leave the woods as you came. If you are to leave, you’ll become food to the woods and we will be imprisoned in the house.” 

 

“I have a life outside of here. My friends are going to wonder where have I been for the past twenty-four hours. I can't tell them jack shit of any of this.” Now his irritation has hit the boiling point. Lance breathes into digest what he said and breathes out his actions. “Okay, yeah, nope, I’m done” Lance walks out in the same direction he came in with Coran and Shiro. He can clearly hear the footsteps coming towards him but Lance can care less right now. He just wants to go home and sleep this nightmare off.

 

“Wha-” Lance cuts Shiro off almost immediately with his hand.

 

“I’m done. I have been at my wits end with this bullshit for almost twenty-four hours and I'm tired. I'm leaving.” Lance reaches for the doorknob as Coran puts his hand on his.

 

“Lance if you leave, you'll never be able to return to the outside world,” Coran said. The air is pleading with Lance not to open the door. He concedes after some time but stays in place.

“Alright then, I'm not moving until I get answers.”

 

“Lance, are you sure that you want to start this?” Shiro asks. His eyes are pleading with Lance to cut this out. Lance counters back.

 

“I’m in the middle of west bumblefuck for something I’m not even apart of. I got the time for this because apparently I can't leave or I die. What even is that?” Lance said. His voice begins to grow more angry than frustrated. All Lance wants is answers.

 

“You are a part of this the moment Keith came to your flat” It was that one-liner that sent Lance straight to the edge. He turns towards the both of them, specifically towards Shiro.

 

“THEN TELL ME WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON. STOP LEAVING ME IN THE DARK OR TAKE ME BACK HOME.” Both Coran and Shiro step back from Lance as if they seen a ghost. Coran is booking it back to the infirmary with Shiro right behind him. Lance is walking at this point to see what’s going on. He wasn't wasting energy anytime soon. When Lance gets there, Coran looks at him again and then at Keith's hands as he picks them up. Shiro, on the other hand, is lost as he looks back and forth between both of them. He’s mumbling ‘this isn’t good’ as he pinches the bridge of his nose. Shiro picks one of Keith's hands and other follows. Both of his wrists were bounded with the same fuzzy thing that was on the ‘crystals’.

 

“Lance, we are in the same boat as you. We don’t know what's going on either.” Shiro said after some time. One of Lance’s eyebrows goes up. He’s clearly not impressed as he crosses his arms.

 

“That’s not comforting at all, but what exactly are you guys. Is Shiro is supposed some type of Oracle?” Lance said. He points a hand towards Shiro’s direction.

 

“Technically but that’s one way to put it,” Shiro said. His hands are pulled up as he shrugs. From the looks of Shiro end, it looks like a complicated story that he’s not willing to share. Lance leaves it at that. He looks at Coran for his answer.

 

“I’m a healer with the affinity to change the atmosphere of this room with my own emotions,” Coran said. Lance puts a hand under his chin.

 

“That makes so much sense earlier...  So, What about Keith? Is he really an angel?” Shiro shakes his head on that question.

 

“It’ll be best if Keith told you himself. Anything else” Shiro ask. 

 

“Yeah what the hell is going on?” Lance said. It feels like the answers aren’t doing much other than creating more holes in a useless net. Nonetheless, it's getting him at least somewhere. 

 

“Just like Shiro has said, we don't know. Whatever it is, it's not good.” Lance sighs to that. He slumps down to the nearest couch and curses. The silence becomes heavy after Coran's words. There’s was also a tension that began to rise in the air. It was unintentional but it was still there until Shiro spoke up.

 

“Do you want us to mine for some Coran?” Shiro speaks up after some time. Coran perks up to the sound of Shiro’s suggestion.

 

“Absolutely, but do you mind mining alone Shiro, I don’t want Lance to hurt himself mining for crystals.” Shiro seemed cool with that as he got up.

 

“Okay, I’ll go in an hour” With that, Shiro walks out of the room. Lance wanted to at least go and help Shiro mine but there was no point in mining for something he couldn’t actually see. The room fell into a comfortable silence, excluding the monitor occasional beeps and Coran scuffling. Lance was nodding off after a few hours. Only to be awakened by Coran’s nudging his right shoulder. Nudging isn’t really cutting it because it's more of a violent rattle.

 

“Lance?” Coran said. His enthusiastic voice was starting to annoy Lance just a bit. Just how is someone able to keep this type of energy for such long periods of time. It’s infectious with the way Lance was getting up with more energy.

 

“Um, yeah?” Lance was gaining more alertness by the rough taps. Coran pushes something into Lance’s line of vision.

 

“Can you see this?” Coran asks him as he pushes the object in his face. Lance moves his arm away from his face to get a better look of what Coran is talking about. He sees something fuzzy. Even when Lance squints he still couldn’t see what exactly Coran is holding. He shakes his head.

 

“Barely, what am I supposed to see” Coran removes the object from Lance’s face as he walks away.

 

“Interesting. Don’t worry about that.” The room was once again encased in silence, but it wasn’t as smothering as the last few. After some time, Coran steps out of the room after mumbling about checking on some books about ‘FCs’ and seals. That leaves Lance alone with Keith, who was now bundled with four thick blankets. How Keith wasn’t overheating in that stifling heat was baffling and almost concerning to Lance. He places his hand on Keith’s forehead after pushing his bangs off of his face. Lance sighs when he doesn't feel that blistering heat that Keith was giving off from before. Keith stirs from the cool touch of Lance’s hand.

 

“Hey Keith, how are you feeling” He stirs a bit more before opening one eye “Keith?”

 

“Lance?” Keith seemed surprised by hearing Lance’s name. 

 

“Yeah? I'm here” Lance said. Keith turns to Lance and mumbles out some words. Lance had to place his head near Keith’s in order to hear what he was saying.

 

“I’ll explain.” Lance gave Keith a questionable look.

 

“What do you mean by that?” Lance ask.

 

“Later.” Just like that, Keith was out like a light. Lance leaves the room after that. He didn’t want to bother Keith if he was resting/healing. Plus, from what Shiro and Coran have said, he doesn’t react very well with whatever they put on him. Keith is going to need more rest to fight off whatever is going on in his body.

 

It takes a while to navigate through the halls of this place. The walls, where they once were peeling with paint and wood are pristine white. After each door, there was a strange structure that holds a light. He finds Coran at the last door. It was a tremendous library that was filled to the brim with books. Coran was currently sitting on a stack of thick, arcane books while reading one.

 

“Lance” Coran calls out. “How is Keith,” He asks

 

“He’s resting at the moment,” Lance said.

 

“That’s good. He should be comfortable until he regains consciousness.” Coran said as he flips the page. The words are written in a different language with all of the geometric shapes and swirls. To Lance, he feels like he's forgotten the vital skill. The words are calling him for something but he can not recall what was it for the life of him.

 

Since Coran is here in this index he could probably tell him about the woods. He has already asked Shiro about it and Keith is out of commission. Against his better judgment and his warning from Keith himself, Lance speaks.

 

“Coran?” Lance asks

 

“Yes, my boy?”

 

“Do you know anyone in the woods?” That made Coran stop reading. He slowly puts the book down.

 

“There's no one. The mother of the woods died a few decades ago due to some unforeseen circumstances.” That made Lance perk up. 

 

“Are you sure?”

 

“Yes. There is nothing in the woods except for the wails of what it used to be” Coran flips the page and begins to highlight something important on there.

 

“And what was that?” Coran closes his book and picks up another one. He looks Lance directly.

 

“Alive.” With that, Coran leaves with a trail of books following him. For the next two days, Lance ponders on what he said and the entity that dwells within the woods until Keith wakes up for the final time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully, more questions are answered in the next chapter and with some Kieth and Lance? IDK >:)
> 
> See ya then.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There were more answers that Lance could handle than he could ask.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After a shitstorm of a semester and having to deal with IRL drama, I'm back. I want to get the ball rolling so let's goooooo. 
> 
> This isn't beta'd at all so apologies in advance if you see any errors that I missed.
> 
> Enjoy :)
> 
> EDIT: Minor edits towards the end

From that point on, things had begun to change with subtilty. The only one that caught on to the changes was Lance. To Shiro, the reality that Lance wasn’t able to perceive before hasn’t changed in the slightest. Lance still can not perceive them, but he’s acutely aware of that tiny exchange of his loosely veiled ‘normalcy’.

It made Lance hyper-aware of his surroundings ever since. There have been numerous times where Lance would look back to see if there’s anyone following him on the nights he’s alone in the parking lot. Sometimes, the hairs of his neck would stand stiff when opening his car door when his paranoia was starting to eat at him. He could still feel the strength of that thing when it attempted to break his door down during the early hours of dawn.

It has been two weeks since Lance saw Keith. There has been no sign of Keith after what that. He doesn’t really have his number or his address. Lance wouldn’t really know how he’s holding up. He wouldn’t blame Keith if he went awol for so long. He wonders if he is doing as well as Shiro has told him. Lance had been asking for Keith ever since they departed from the woods in the beat up car. Shiro had offered to help with the repairs of the car and Lance had tried to shut the thought of it down. Shiro, on the other hand, dropped Lance off at his place and drove off with his car with the promise to return it in three weeks in perfect condition, if not sooner.

Since then, Lance has been ubering/lyfting/transiting, etc. whatever he could to get to class. Not the greatest idea, since he been running low on cash. He was just about to text Shiro about his car when an unknown number texts him.

@$%#$%^$$  
Is this Lance Serrano?

Lance was perplexed. He hasn’t given anyone his number in the last month, let alone his full name. Lance was about to block the number when it texts back.

@$%#$%^$$  
This is Keith

Of course, it was Keith. It makes more sense that Shiro may have given Keith his number. Lance saves the number and begins to text him back.

Lance  
Keith?  
Are you okay?  
Its been 2 weeks.  
Where have you been?

Keith  
I’m fine. I have been staying at Shiro’s place for the time being to recover. 

Lance  
Can I come over to visit?

Keith  
No.

Lance  
Why not?

Keith  
I’m not in a good position to speak or interact with anyone at the moment. That’s what Adam said.

Lance  
Who’s Adam?  
NVM that last thought  
When would be a good time to talk?  
I need answers about what happened that night.  
Please.

Keith  
Next week

Lance  
Next week?

Keith  
Next week, I’ll tell you the details on when and where to meet up.

Lance  
Okay.

Lance spends the rest of the week worrying. He spends it thinking about what he was going to ask. What he’s not going to ask. Preparing himself for answers he not ready and for answers that will make him move forward. When the day came, he gets out late from class and rushes to the cafe. Lance doesn’t see immediately see Keith in the cafe. He begins to wander around the cafe in search of a mop of inky black hair.

It took Lance some time to actually find Keith because the said person just loves to blend in with his surroundings. Keith was sitting in a booth towards the back of the cafe and towards the bathroom. From the looks of it, Keith had ordered a drink and began a lengthy book while he was waiting for him. Upon closer inspection, the title was in geometric shapes and points. How Keith understands that is beyond what Lance could think. Then again, a few weeks ago had been... Something else.

“You’re late” was what Keith said when Lance sits down. He sits the book down on the table.

“I'm sorry, it's not my fault that you like to blend in with everything at the back of the cafe” Keith stares at Lance for a bit and sighs. He shakes his head before responding.

“Funny, I texted you where I was going to be sitting an hour prior.” With that, Lance looks at him and then scrambles to his phone to see if Keith actually sent that message. (He did.)

“Ohh...Jeez...” Lance scrolls through a very detailed message with wide eyes. How Keith manages to text an essay long text in his current condition is still baffling to Lance. 

“'Ohh’ is right.” Keith clips some of his hair to his ear and begins to sip from the cup in front of him.

He appears unfazed about what happened a few weeks ago. Almost the entirety of his left face was still patched up with gauze and bandages. Most of his head bandages were covered by a red beanie while his hair covered the left side of his face. His neck and hands were patched up as well but it was barely visible because of the turtleneck and fingerless gloves he was wearing. If someone looked closely into his fragile image, they would have seen the gauge that hugs snuggly around his ring and middle fingers and his thumb on both of his hands. Keith's jacket was hanging around his shoulders. Lance knows that he is still patched up to the nines if he wasn't wearing such heavy clothing. His crutches were sitting behind him, ready to use at a moment's notice.

Even if Keith is giving off this stoic façade, there is a haunted look in his eyes. His hands were tense around his drink every five to ten seconds ever since Lance showed up. Keith’s eyes make quick glances towards the window and entrance. His body posture is just screaming at him to leave this establishment and/or possibly leave this area and never step foot on this ground again. Yet, Keith remains in his chair, keeping up with his act.

“Keith?” The seriousness in Lance's voice caught Keith off guard and his act drop for a mere second. In that second, fear had taken over with a jolt backward.

“Yeah?” The mask was placed right back on. Lance didn't miss the way Keith checks himself to make sure that nothing was cracking through. He thinks about how he was going to word his next sentence but there was no point because there was no way to rework it without losing its meaning.

“Are you okay?” Keith gives him a confused look.

“Yeah, why are you asking.” Lance shakes and rakes his hair with his hands.

“No, I'm not talking about physically because we both know the answer to that.” Lance gives him a look while Keith rolls his eyes. Lance sighs and continues “I'm talking about if you are okay here.” Lance points to his head. Keith doesn't seem to get it as his head slightly tilted to the right.

“I'm talking about your mind, Keith. What's going on in there?” Lance taps his head for Keith to get the message. Keith does but gives Lance a hesitated response.”You spaced out for a second.” Keith keeps quiet for the next few moments, not really thinking or talking about the subject at hand. Lance thinks about what he wants to say but shakes his head. “I... understand that the last couple of weeks has been... overwhelming... For the both of us” Keith snorts at that. That phrase was directed more towards Lance. A better word for it would be terrifying. “And I know that you don’t know me very well, rather, at all.” Before Keith could interject, Lance pushes on. “But if you need to talk to someone about anything. Anything, I’m always here. Even if I don’t know all of the things you know of.” 

“Okay...” Keith leans back in his chair to digest what Lance was proposing as it got quiet. He was in deep thought when Lance speaks up to end the silence. “You said a few weeks ago, that you’ll explain something before going out again. What did you mean by that?” Lance begins to look around and see that they were very secluded from the cafe. Everything and one was about a table or two away from them. Even the servers stayed away from them. He looks back at Keith to see an uneasy expression growing on him. 'That’s not good’ Lance thought.

“I wanted to ask you something-” There was a crash and both of their heads had made a sharp right turn. One of the servers had dropped a plate on the floor. Which was weird because while everyone else was minding their business, Keith was on edge, and Lance was mildly concerned about the server. The crash was loud, everyone was supposed to at least look over at this general direction and check out what's going on. Nobody stirred. The server had shot the both of them an annoyed look and Keith counters it with a nasty look. How Keith was able to manage with just one eye is just as baffling as what was going on. The server and Keith lock eyes with each other as they continue their silent battle. For a slip of the second, both of their eyes began to glow.

“Okay, as you were saying?” Lance said to break Keith from whatever war that was going on with the server. The server gets up and leaves but the plate that shattered on the floor had disappeared from existence. Lance double takes the floor. “Where is it?”

“Where’s what?”

“The plate. Where is the plate on the floor?” Lance points to the polished floor. Keith glances at it and shrugs.

“I don't know, don't worry about it.” Lance looks at the floor one last time with an offended look and looks back at Keith. There was an emotion that he couldn’t place a name on as of now, but it there was a storm that was brewed into his eyebrow.

“What were you going to explain to me?” There is a hard look at both of their faces. Keith speaks up.

“The explanation was originally in the form of a question.” Lance gives him a skeptical look as he brings his hand to question him.

“That is what?”

“If you could be my paladin.”

“A paladin?” One of Lance’s eyebrows had shot up like it was asking the question. 

“Yes” 

“A real-life Paladin?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you sure about electing me to be your paladin? I don’t think I’m cut out for what you want me to do.”

“What do you think a paladin does?” Lance slouches forward.

“Aren’t they like a high ranking knight who rids the world of evil?” Lance began to pack the air with his hands with the answer, but the answer started to feel like the question at hand.

“Basically? I don’t know exactly how to tell you what they do.” Keith rakes his hair as he ponders on how to move forward. He looks at Lance’s hands and a lightbulb has been turned on in Keith's head. “You know what, it’s better if I show you what I mean.” Keith looks around to see that the cafe was packed but the five tables around their booth were still empty. “Put your hands on the table for me”.

“Um sure” Lance grows weary of this. His hands give out hesitance to the point of Keith grabbing his hands and laces his fingers through Lance’s. “What exactly are you doing?”

“You'll see in a second.” Was all Keith said as the table begins to slightly rumble. Lance looks under the table to see if Keith was using his knees to shake the table (he wasn't.) “I'll advise you to close your eyes and keep your mind as blank as possible. The last thing I want to do is to see what’s lurking in your head.” 

Lance finally looks up at Keith and realizes that he made a mistake by looking at him. Keith's good eye was closed and he has this calm look in his face. Almost serene look that made Lance admire the long lashes that he had and slight plump look of his lips. Some of his hair that he clipped behind his ear had begun to slip out and covered a part of his face. One of Keith's uncovered eyes, however, pops open to see that Lance was doing the exact opposite of what he told him to do.

“Quit ogling me and close your eyes.” Keith bluntly said it and Lance sputters.

“I'M NOT” Lance screamed out. There was a faint blush on both of their faces as both of them closes their eyes. Lance, however, didn't miss the very faint sound of Keith's voice. There was a bit of distortion to it but it wasn't enough to catch concerns. Well, more concerns that he could think of. As if the person from the woods has influenced Keith at some point in his life. At this point of Lance’s life, nothing shouldn’t surprise him anymore. Here he is, wide-eyed and spooked. Lance closes his eyes afterward, not trying to have Keith to misinterpret anything else. “Now clear your mind to the best of your ability and whatever else you do, do not open your eyes with your present body until you hear me say ‘take us back’”

With that note, Lance begins to see things that aren't supposed to be here in the darkness in his mind. Scratch that, Lance wasn't supposed to feel weightless. He could feel himself floating. Lance opens his eyes to see that time has stopped. Everyone from the cafe was at a standstill. Some of them were in mid-drink and some others were in mid-laugh. Lance begins to drift between the people in the cafe. He waves his hands in front of them to stir a reaction, but alas, they were stuck in time. Lance had to glide his hand toward someone's face to have it fazed through. The thought of Lance being probably dead or in purgatory didn’t strike him at all. At the end of all of this, Lance wanted answers and to be left alone. He can’t have both at the same time. Lance decides to go right back to his body to see whether or not Keith is in the same predicament as him. When Lance thinks back a few minutes ago, it was Keith who placed him here.

Lance thought that probably this was a joke and entirety of this particular joke is getting to the fucky ducky stage when he sees their bodies. Both of them was holding hands and looking as serene as possible. Lance takes a better look at Keith from here. He realizes that Keith's hair wasn’t a platinum white but a platinum pink. From how he sees Keith, his hair is always either placed in a messy bun or a low ponytail with his long fringes out. It just so happens that Keith has his eyes open. His eyes have a faint glow to them, but notices that his pupils are missing. It was unnerving, how that’s possible is completely out his knowledge. He waves a hand in front of Keith. 

“I wouldn’t do that if I was you.” Lance's head turned so fast that even the voice that called him flinches. It was from Keith. He looked like the same Keith from that night but he looked brighter than the one that was supposed to be sitting in front of him. He was practically glowing as he basked in the sun. His wings were just as large as what he saw last time. His clothes were a creme color tunic with gold decoratives. There was no impurities or bandages that scatter around his body. With this, he almost looked like he was chisel out of diamond and marble and not the shell of Keith that was sitting in the cafe.

“And why is that?” Keith points to his body, making sure that he’s leading Lance’s eyes towards his face.

“My present body can react negatively if there is a disturbance in the air. Even if my conscious standing right next to you like this. The last thing I need is to be warped back into my body with you stuck here.” Keith said nonchalantly. That didn’t comfort Lance at all as he puts his hands into his pockets and keeps them there. Instead of asking how does that work or what would happen if the latter happened, Lance asks:

“What is here exactly?” Keith looks at Lance. 

“This is what you would call an out-of-body experience, but you are in my sub-space? I don’t remember the term for it.” Lance has the faint feeling that he knows what Keith is talking about, but it not recognizable in his vocabulary. It’s right on the tip of his tongue, but something is blocking him from uttering it.

“Would this mean I'm dead?” Lance asks. 

“No, that’s in-between.” Lance frowns to that before leaving it be. He is more concerned with the fact that someone could be wondering what’s going on at their side of the cafe. If that’s even possible. Lance is curious about how this is works out in their favor if someone else decides to come in the cafe to see that everything is a pause and disconnected from life outside. That is an if, Lance isn’t sure how long Keith could keep this up. He guesses that with the injuries that he’s sustained from before plus having a few healed means that he doesn’t have that much time. Then again, Lance is only assuming such things and can be proven wrong at any given time.

“Are you coming or what?” Keith asks as he holds out his hand to Lance. It takes Lance out from his head to see Keith’s hand. He wasn’t really sure if this is something he was ready to do or witness. At the same time, he wants answers.

“Do I have a choice?” Lance said. He looks at Keith and his hand. Keith rolls his eyes.

“You wanted answers, right?” Keith takes both of his hand and unravels his wings from their hiding. He gives a good few test flaps before covering both of them with his wings. There was a brief flash of light before fading into darkness and back into the light. The wings had open them to a new location. 

The sun glazed the land in both a hazy heat and lazy light. It was enough to coat them in surreal light. Lance could feel himself sink into the land a bit. He looks down to see that cafe floors had shifted to sand. In the distance, dunes had stood tall and far from their location. The heat is what took Lance by surprise. He immediately takes off his jacket and wraps it around his waist. Lance begins to look around for Keith when he looks down to a shack. 

‘He's probably in there’ Lance thought as he begins his descent to the shack. Descending slowly becomes a steep stumbling down to the base of the shack. ‘Now there’s sand everywhere’ Lance thought as he gets up to wipe the sand off uselessly. He kicks off some sand before entering the shack. He sees Keith sitting in a corner, searching. 

“Took you long enough,” Keith spoke.

“You left me up there. What do you mean ‘Took you long enough’”

“To come in, dumbass.” Keith looks up and glances Lance’s direction before heading over to the next corner. “Although it may not look like it, we are technically in my head.”

“It looks organized.” There was a hint of sarcasm in that. Keith rolls his eyes.

“You can sit on the couch while I find it. Just don’t touch anything.” Keith said as he floats up to another shell. Lance begins to look around the shack. It was chaos with all of the books and papers all over the floor and coffee table. There were maps plastered almost everywhere on the wall. A red string had made its mark repeatedly in one map in, in one area leading to a cave system as shown as a picture above. Lance notices a ripped, ragged picture that was framed at the top of the map. Before Lance could get up to take a better look of the image, a thick, hardcover book was slammed on the table. Shocking Lance out of his trance. 

“There,” Keith said. There was a slight sheen of sweat with faint puffs of air. Keith sits by the corner of the couch to catch his breath.

“What is this?” Lance picks the book and observes it. The book looks plain with the geometric text lettering the front. It held some weight to it since it was slammed on to the table. The book was tightly bound with a polychromatic ribbon. “Do I have to read all of this?” Lance asks as he taps the book three times. The seal breaks almost immediately. Lance stares at the book in awe. Even Keith was taken back from the motion of the book with a flinch. There was a nervous chuckle that escaped Lance for a second. He points back at the book.

“So what do I do with this?” Lance ask. He wasn’t so keen on touching the book after that stunt.

“Open it.” Was all Keith said, Lance stares at the book wearily, but pushes forward nonetheless. Before he opens the book, Keith grabs his hand firmly with support and assurance.”When you do open the book, say ‘paladin’” With that Lance opens the book. Its pages glowed with gold as the question ‘What Do You Seek?’ seeps in a bold light. 

“Paladin” was all Lance said in a firm voice. Just as quickly he had said the word it was just as quickly the both of them were sucked into the book. To Lance, it was vivid flashes of blue and white before flashing into a pastel blue sky. 

Lance blinks as the scene before him settles into a meadow of wildflowers. The sunlight touches each and every one of them to give of a vibrant shade of blues, yellows, reds, and public. He begins to notices that he was sitting under a tree in full body armor. There was a rather large blue mountain lion resting its head on his lap. Lance was confused nonetheless, but happy that the cat was sleeping. Before he could address the lion he notices Keith sitting on a branch above him, sleeping. The said person wakes up, smiles and points beyond the horizon. 

Just as Lance begins to ask him what, the scene changes to him riding on a horse, who’s carrying a carton of food supply to a nearby town. He could hear the people of the village cheering as he approaches them. Keith hovers right above Lance and his horse enters the village. He gets off the horse while Keith flies a bit further off to land. He walks back to Lance as he helps distribute the food. While that was going on, Keith hands him a geometric blue and white handle.

“What’s this?” Lance asks.

“This is a bayard,” Keith said as he faces forward again. Lance looks over to see the scene changed again. This time, instead of the peaceful background that he was accustomed to, the land was war-battered. There was a fire in the distance with flashes of light in the front light. Lance was facing them. He didn’t need to look up because Keith was already in the air. When he did look up, Keith was in armor as well with switchblades. There were more angels like Keith in position. Lance didn’t need to look back. He could feel the strength of an army behind him, waiting on his command. He raised the Bayard that Keith gave him and it transformed into a broad sword. Before he knew it, Lance lowers his sword and charges at the flashes of light. Angels and paladins alike follow suit. The brilliance in the flashes became violently vivid as they came towards them. With a flash of light, it was over. 

Lance blinks once more to see that he was back in the shack. In the desert, without the armor, but he’s still holding the Bayard that Keith gave him a few minutes prior. He chucks both the book and the Bayard at Keith and hides behind the couch. Keith catches both of them.

“What the hell was that?” Lance points at the book

“That is called projecting,” Keith said as he places the book down. The book wraps itself back in its polychromatic ribbon. Lance points at Keith as the said person walks towards them with the Bayard.

“Are you an angel?”

“Yes.” Keith pauses for a few moments before continuing. “A guardian angel if you want to be technical.” Lance took notice of the pause. He wanted to ask why did he pause like that but his brain was already supplying this sentence:

“A GUARDIAN ANGEL!? KEITH, WHAT THE FUCK!”

“Yea-.” Lance gets up from where he was and begins to pace frantically.

“This means that’s all true, with this whole angels and demons and shit.” Lance’s hands were doing most of the talking; throwing them up and then placing them on his head.

“Actually, demons are a common enemy towards both races, they have nothing to do with us since there are two types of angels. They generally leave us alone for the most part. That's beside the point” Keith said casually, like that helped Lance quell the turmoil that was running rampant in his head. Lance stops his pacing and stares at him. Hard.

“THERE’S DIFFERENT TYPES OF ANGELS!?”

“Yes, b-”

“AND ANGEL RACES?”

“LANCE” Keith yells at Lance. He uses his hands to lower the sudden tension brought on by Lance in the shack. “Calm down and breathe.” Lance takes in a large amount of air and huffs it out. He takes a seat on the couch and crosses his arms. “I understand that you are a bit overwhelmed.” Lance chuckles bitterly.

“Overwhelmed doesn’t really cover it, Keith”

“Okay, um, let’s go back and talk about all of this. I don’t think we can stay here any longer.”

“Alright.” Lance sits down and waits. He looks around one last time while he fiddles with his hands. “So how does one goes back from here?” Lance ask. Keith shakes his head with a hand holding the side of his head.

“I’m going to need you to inhale through your nose and exhale with your mouth. Repeat this three times,” Keith said. Lance just looks at him with skepticism.

“That’s it?”

“Yeah. That’s it. The catch is that you need to keep your eyes closed.”

“Okay then.” As Lance closes his eyes, he could feel a sudden warmth from where Keith took his hand. It almost felt like the sun on those warm days. Just as quietly as he inhaled, a light arose just as quietly outside from behind his eyelids.

“Take us back” Was what Keith said under his breath after Lance exhales. He could feel himself being thrown back to the present. In the cafe, where he and Keith left their present bodies at the back of the cafe. Lance could feel his being reconfiguring back into himself after who knows how long its been.

His eyes flutter open to see the cafe going back to its casual self. People were chatting with each other. Still oblivious to what transpired at the back of the cafe where Lance and Keith sat. Once Lance gets his bearings back, he looks over at Keith to see if he’s doing the same. 

He across the table to see Keith's hair revert back to the silky black hair that he was used to seeing. Keith’s grip tightens on Lance’s hands, causing him to hiss. The grip loosens dramatically as Keith’s hands go slack. They stay like that in silence for a bit, sans Keith labored breathing. 

“Are you o– WOAH!” Lance jumps immediately to Keith’s side when he began to face plant into his drink. Lance barely manages to catch him from his seat. He gets up to set Keith back in his chair.   
“Yeah, just very tired,” Keith said. A heavy pause blankets the both of them for just a bit as Lance brings a few chairs to make a makeshift bed for Keith. He places Keith's head on one side and his legs on another side. Lance takes off his jacket to make a makeshift pillow for Keith’s leg. Lance stares at Keith for a bit. From what he has witnessed. What he saw, he can’t phantom that world, let alone sees it properly. Lance begins to talk, although, his brain begins to malfunction; reducing his comprehension to caveman understanding.

“So you are meaning to tell me to become a paladin? Your paladin?” Lance said. Keith nods to confirm his question. Lance’s hands have found their way to his face, just to cover his mouth and cradle one side of his face. Lance felt an uneasy wave of fear. Like a wave of doom washes over him in a turmoil. He could feel himself slowly sinking from this. Keith seems to sense this and places his hand on Lance’s shoulder. 

“Lance, I’m not forcing you to do this,” Keith looks directly at Lance. They held eye contact for a bit before Lance broke contact to stare at the floor. 

“I know, I know” Lance places his hands on top of his head. He could feel himself drowning in all of this. With all of his responsibilities that he has to deal with now is already enough for him to lock himself in his room, under a blanket, and hide from it all. Adding this will tip him over that. “Do you mind if I think this over? This whole paladin thing is...” He shakes his head in his hands. “Overwhelming is an understatement at the moment.” Keith nods and looks up.

“Take as much time as you need,” Keith said. He sounds like he was about to drift into a deep sleep. Lance doesn’t think that it’s a great idea for Keith to nod off here and begins to shake his shoulder. Keith seemed annoyed by the gesture but stays up, nonetheless.

"How are you getting home?" Lance ask. Keith shakes his head. “I mean to Shiro’s place.” Keith shakes his head again. “Do you want to come back to my place with me?” There was a brief pause before Keith nods his head. “I’ll be studying for an up and coming quiz for next week, I won’t be able to keep you company”

“That’s fine. I just wanna sleep.” Keith said. He pulls out the same matchbox bed that Shiro brought out from that night from his pocket and places it in Lance’s hand. He begins to glow faintly with a bit of discomfort before shrinking down to size. Lance helps Keith into the box and even puts small support for Keith's leg. “Thank you....” Was all Keith aid before he drifted off to sleep.

Lance, still in awe of this, places the box in his pocket and walks out of the cafe. The cafe resumes to what it was before, with the chattering and eating, without knowing what went on at the back of the cafe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The great thing is that I started chapter five. The better thing is that more interaction with them. Also, we also get to know what Lance's answer.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's a small exchange of words from Lance and Keith. Nothing More

Keith becomes a frequent being at Lance’s place for the next five months. At first, it was only to sleep in the matchbox bed that he keeps lugging around. Nonetheless, not only it was convenient, it's portable. It became a frequent thing for Keith to help Lance with his calculus homework while in his tiny form. 

There have been a few times where Hunk and Pidge came by to either chill or study for a bit with Lance. During that time, Keith is either out with Shiro and Adam at their place or roaming around Lance’s bedroom. There was a time where Keith was sleeping in his bed when they came in to chill. Lance kinda took the matchbox and threw it somewhere in his room to avoid Hunk’s finger and Pidge’s probing. He did, however, get a face full furious, messy hair Keith in full size once they left. As much as Lance wants to introduce Keith to his friends, he feels like he’s introducing a brewing problem to them. Something that Lance is not willing to do.

Today is one of those days where Keith roam around the coffee table, just to play with the school supplies that Lance laid out for his studies. Lance as of now was studying for a few finals for next week. His wings were out for display today as well. 

“It looks like you are having fun,” Lance said. His head doesn't move from his textbook. Keith floats up to a stack of textbooks and sits on top while being mindful of his leg.

“Hmm.” Lance doesn’t pay him much mind. He looks down from the stack and at Lance’s homework. Keith squints at it before pointing at it. “Lance?” Keith said while he looks at him.

“What?” Lance said. 

“That’s wrong” That pique Lance as he places the textbook down. He looks at Keith, then the homework that laid there all sloppy across the table. Lance looks at him again and followed where his tiny arm pointed to. The paper that he was pointing to was a structural formula for table sugar. Lance frowns as he brings the worksheet towards him.

“You know that this is biochem, not calc,” Lance said while giving him a skeptical look. 

“I know, you’re missing an OH stem rii-” Keith gets up and speeds over to where he was pointing. He hovers over to the structure problem “iiight over here” He points over for Lance to correct the structure.

“Thank you, I didn’t know that you got your Ph.D. in biochemistry,” Lance said although there was a sprinkle of sarcasm along the lines. Keith didn’t catch it. He sits right back from where he was before and continues. 

“Off the land, I learned this already. On the land here, it's considered a doctorate degree here?” Lance’s eyebrows fly up with what Keith said That’s when he really looks at Keith or a rather tiny Keith skeptically. The said person leans back to another textbook stack.

“In what exactly?” Lance places an arm on the table and puts his chin in his hand as he leans in. Keith crosses his arms defensively.

“Um... Math, science, and English” Lance nods and takes a mental note on that. He leans back.

“So, why are you here ‘on the land’ that is.” Lance's finger quotes it. If Keith says all of this, then there is no need for him to be here. Let alone helping Lance with his homework. Keith could have been off doing whatever he wants easily. Why here? 

Keith, on the other hand, looks away uncomfortably. He was deep in thought about what he should say next. He settles on this:

“I didn’t want to be there anymore?” and leaves it at that. Keith looks already uncomfortable with the subject as it is. Lance gives him another look before changing the subject. There was no need to push it out of him anyway.

“Okay, moving right along.” Lance goes back from what he was doing before, looking idly at the biochemistry textbook for his final that is next week. “What’s up with the jacket? You never took it off ever since I met you last summer.” 

That made Keith physically flinch as he subconsciously touches the jacket. It was an old red and white leather cropped jacket with yellow stripes on the chest. The only difference from the jacket was that it has secret slits for his wings when he wants to fly. He was about to say something regretful, but he held his tongue and thinks about how to approach the subject.

“I wear it to hide my wings, but I mainly wear it because I’m always cold,” Keith said. Lance hums to that. He takes additional notes on the fact that they were in the middle of May. Spring weather was webbing out to get ready for summer.

“Are you anemic?” Lance’s eyebrows perk up, but he’s still reading. Keith crosses his arms again in deep thought.

“No, I don’t think so.” 

“I can put the heat on if you’re cold.” Lance begins to move a small pocket heater from the couch. Keith flies over to his hand.

“No, that's fine.”Lance hums again and goes back to reading. Keith, on the other hand, sits on top of Lance’s head, observing. It becomes quiet after that. Minutes become hours as Lance takes notes on what he’s reading with Keith giving advice along the way. 

Before they knew, it was ten in the evening. Lance closes the textbook and stretches out with a yawn. He looks around for Keith to see him reading a chapter on chemical reactions. It's kinda weird, just observing him in his element. It has been thirty minutes since he moved that position. Just reading, without movement. Against Lance’s better judgment, he pokes Keith with a finger. It did earn him a tiny slap on the finger and a glare, but he continued. Lance snickers as he continues to poke Keith until Keith faces him with the finger and tells him to fuck off. He goes back to his reading state before.

“Hey, are you staying the night again?” That made Keith perk up. He looks to see the time and his eyes widen. He puts a hand to his lips while in deep in thought. Keith looks back at him once he makes his conclusion. 

“Do you mind?” He floats over to his phone and does a series of hops and skips to unlock his phone. From the looks of things, Keith is about to tell Shiro or this Adam dude that he keeps referring to as he slaps the various keys on the phone as a message.

“Nah, I’ll take your bed to my room. Just wash up” Keith nods as he finishes his message. A second later, he receives a thumbs up from Adam and a ‘Stay safe from Shiro. Although, they also sent a message in the same geometric symbols from Keith’s book from the cafe.

“Okay, Thank you.” Lance gets up to neatly pack up his stuff on the table and walks over to the room while leaving it ajar for Keith to come flying into his bed. Under the lamplight, next to the picture frame with the two chains hugging the frame. 

After some time, Keith does zoom in with a large T-shirt on to the nightstand to observe the frame. He could see tiny Lance with a porcelain arm sling tightly around his neck. Almost as if he was placing him in a chokehold, but Lance was smiling in a pointy birthday hat. He places a hand on the frame and gives it a somber look before looking up at the red and blue chains. Before he could touch it, the hairs of the back of his neck were standing still. As if he was being watched, he turns to see Lance’s giant head watching him. Keith backs away from the frame.

“You can see that?” Lance asks.

“Yeah, why did you ask?” Keith said. He keeps his eyes trained to the floor, or rather the nightstand floor. Lance shrugs to the question as he gets in his bed.

“Just wondering. Shiro said that he couldn’t see it so I thought that it could be the same for you.” Keith hums to that as he gets in his bed and under the blanket. The blanket was thick enough to keep drafty from the vent above him. Lance was considering on putting the heat up for him, but that also means that he’s gonna be hot as well. Lance remembers the last time he did that, he had to sleep on the couch because it got unbearably hot in the room. It didn’t help the fact that Keith didn’t shed the heavy blanket, only to bury himself further in. He decides against it.

“I don’t know. It’s probably just an Oracle thing. Probably.” Keith said. The room becomes silent after that. Besides the fact that of Lance’s mindless taps on his phone. Keith could feel himself being lulled to sleep by the incessant tapping but it stops with a button and a small sound from being placed down to the nightstand. He could feel the strong vibration of the phone, indicating that it's charging peacefully. His eyes began to droop when Lance breaks the silence.

“What was your childhood like?” Lance asked. That made Keith burrow his eyebrows. What’s making him ask such a question like that. Especially at a time like this when he was about to doze off. Keith turns to Lance to see that he’s not giving him any sort of eye contact. His eyes were trained to the ceiling at most.

“Why do you ask?” Keith asks. 

“Curious. Plus, can’t sleep.” Lance shrugs. Keith could feel a certain type of boredom webbing from Lance. 

“So you want to start idle talk to sleep” Keith looks up to the ceiling as well. 

“Just go along with it. Or you could ignore me” As much as Keith would like to, he couldn’t. He sits upright and brings his knees up as he sighs. Keith rests his head on his knees out of comfort.

“Fine. I don’t remember much of it. Most of it was spent learning and training." Lance turns to his side to look at Keith. He was shocked. Something that Keith didn’t understand.

“Really??? Can you ride a bike?” Lance asked. There was a brief pause before Keith continued.

“No” Keith shakes his head.

“Did you have or went to a birthday party?”

“No” Lance gasps and covers his mouth as he presses on.

“Went to an amusement park?”

“What’s that?” Lance’s eyebrows were up and his eyes were wide as he pressed on.

“Went to the movies?”

“Does documentaries count?” This made Lance sit up from his bed. There was an exasperated look to his face. 

“NO... no... no... Um...” Lance rubs his face with a hand and looks at Keith once more. 

“Wow, did you have a childhood? Like at all?”

“As I said before, I don’t remember much of it. It's all bits and pieces” There was an unnamed emotion on his face. He plops himself back on to the bed

“Do you mind if I can recreate them with you?” Lance asks. He looks down at his fingers and plays with thumbs. “If that’s cool with you” Keith stares at the suggestion. He could agree that it was an odd one. Someone who is willing to certain places with him just to recreate childish memories like that. It was sweet. There was a small smile on Keith’s face as he turns away from Lance. He only did that so that Lance couldn’t see the strawberry cheeks and the glossy eyes on his face.

“That’s nice of you to do... Thank you” Keith said. Lance nods and settles down again in his bed. There was also a small smile on his face as he begins to plan some small activities for the summer. After finishing studying for tests and working on papers for next week. Lance sighs as he sinks further into the bed.

“Night Keith,” Lance said. Keith didn’t respond, he already dozed off peacefully. Lance is glad that he was sleeping off, only because he has been through a lot ever since November. Though it's only the minor issues that have been happening on Keith’s side. Lance falls asleep with that thought, wondering what would happen if he knew what Keith knows and what he has to go through every day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is the beginning of most not all of the buffer chapters. Just so that its a breath of fresh air before continuing.

**Author's Note:**

> Did you like it? Send me some comments and or kudos if you did. If you want to scream at me here or at my Tumblr then be my guess. 
> 
> Until next time  
> [My Tumblr](http://www.stop-klancing-around.tumblr.com)


End file.
